Bruce Boon analyses the political situation in Indonesia in the light of the events of September 11.

"Hegel remarks somewhere that all the events and
personalities of great importance in world history occur, as it were,
twice. He forgot to add: the first time as a tragedy, the second as a
farce."

Karl Marx in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis
Bonaparte

With the birth of Indonesia in 1945, it's first President Sukarno
wrote a classic tragedy with himself as the tragic hero bound to fall
from his heavenly heights and die a lonely death. Incarnated in this
life of a president is the heroic story of a people, the tragedy of
an ideology and with it the masses it led. The heroes are the workers
and peasants who fought a class war for liberation from oppression, a
battle against imperialists, aristocracy (bupati) and national
bourgeoisie. The tragedy is the death-end of Sukarno's anti-colonial
nationalism and its aide in the Stalinism of Aidit, leader of the
Indonesian Communist Party (PKI). Pushed by the masses the colonial
revolution meant a massive leap forward. But the PKI leadership
rejected the road of a permanent revolution towards socialism.
Instead of relying on the power of the masses, they preferred to play
the game of elite politics and relied on Sukarno to counterbalance
the military reaction. The inevitable consequence of this tactic was
the defeat of the revolution and the genocide of the Left by the
counter-revolutionary forces of General Suharto. In the year 1966
begins the so-called New Order regime.

1998 is the year that the Indonesian Revolution was reinvented.
Led by the students and the illegal labour unions, the masses stood
up against Dictator Suharto . Since then Indonesia has been the scene
of revolution and counter-revolution. In the process of revolution
illusions come up and will be smashed. The current incarnation of
illusions is the new president, Megawati Sukarnoputri, daughter of
Sukarno. After the bloody rule of the New Order, Sukarno's Old Order
tragedy is recycled as a New Order farce. The contemporary repetition
of Indonesian nationalism under President Megawati is indeed a farce
because today there is nothing progressive and revolutionary in her
nationalism. The colonies are already liberated from direct political
domination; they have achieved political sovereignty. Yet the
colonial masses have bumped into the limits of capitalist domination,
from which there can't be national liberation. Only a fight for
international socialism can bring this liberation.

In the unfolding revolution the masses will have to expose all
illusions in Sukarno. For now, in line with Marx' analysis, "the
tradition of all the generations of the death weighs like a nightmare
on the brain of the living. And just when they seem involved in
revolutionising themselves and things, in creating something that has
never before existed, it is precisely in such periods of
revolutionary crisis that they anxiously conjure up the spirits of
the past to their service and borrow names, battle cries and costumes
from them in order to act out the new scene of world history in this
time-honoured disguise and this borrowed language (2) ." On the basis
of such illusions in the past, in the mythical person of Sukarno, a
grotesque and mediocre personality as Megawati could grab power as
the result of the bourgeois infighting over assets and government
control(3). After her first months in reign, she has proven that
bourgeois nationalism means nothing more than being a satellite state
of imperialism.

Together with some top ministers and leading businessmen President
Megawati on September 18 set sail for a 9-day working visit in the
U.S., where she met President Bush. Also on her schedule were
meetings with International Monetary Fund (IMF) president Horst
Koehler and World Bank president James Wolfensohn, and with several
CEOs of American oil companies operating in Indonesia. In spite of
the chaos surrounding the S11 terrorist attack on the U.S., the
American ruling class seemed eager to meet Megawati and her entourage
in what was before S11 announced as a visit to gain support for the
economic recovery of Indonesia. After the World Trade Center inferno
the Bush administration shifted its rhetoric to "looking for allies
in the global combat against terrorism". Both reasons, 'economic
recovery' and 'combat against terrorism', serve however to cover the
real intent behind the talks: assigning Indonesia a place on the new
geopolitical world map.

Nurturing Fundamentalism

Megawati's U.S. visit was taking place at a time when the two
countries are facing terrorism, allegedly from ultra-right Muslims.
Last year on Christmas Eve and last July, Indonesia was the stage of
a series of bomb attacks on churches and shopping malls. The
Indonesian police say that they have found evidence linking the
bombings to Malaysian Muslim extremists. And again on Sunday 23
September, just days after President Megawati joined the U.S.-led
global war on terrorism, at least two explosions rocked the Atrium
Plaza shopping mall in Central Jakarta's busy Senen business
district. Since the U.S. attack on Afghanistan bomb explosions have
mushroomed throughout Indonesia. Even if we are not sure who exactly
committed these bombings &endash; especially in a corrupt country
like Indonesia &endash; it is clear that terrorism is spreading, and
that the perpetrators claim to do it for the cause of Islam.

There is a possibility that the right wing of the state apparatus
is creating this atmosphere of terror in order to get public opinion
to support the expansion of the repressive machinery and a clamp down
on every supposed terrorist group, including left wing activists.
Nevertheless it is beyond doubt that fundamentalism is on the rise in
Indonesia, just like in the Philippines and Malaysia. Although the
majority of Indonesian Muslims is historically very moderate and open
in its interpretation of the Koran, we have seen in the last few
years again an upsurge in extremist interpretations and actions.

Laskar Jihad is a good example of such a fundamentalist group.
They recruit fighters and collect money to support the Holy War
against the Christians in the Moluccas(4). Its commander Jaffar Umar
Thalib used to be a mujahideen fighter in Afghanistan. According to
Al Chaidar, an academic who wrote several books on radical Islam in
Indonesia, the international mujahideen network, made up of former
fighters from Chechnya, Kashmir, the southern Philippines, Pakistan
and Saudi Arabia, held meetings in Malaysia in 1999 and 2000. At that
moment they pinpointed Indonesia as the ideal place to develop their
movement. "They called Indonesia the number one country in terms of
looseness, corruption, and instability. They decided it was very easy
to infiltrate and a very good place to develop themselves," he said
as quoted by AFP(5).

On several occasions fundamentalist groups like Angkatan Muda
Ka'bah (AMK) and Gerakan Pemuda Ka'bah (GPK) attacked leftist and
labour activists, like last June at an international conference in
Bogor. AMK and GPK are fundamentalist groups of criminal youth set up
by the local military and the United Development Party (PPP).

Also this year, several right wing forces joined in the Aliansi
Anti-Komunis (Anti-Communist Alliance) and raided bookshops for
socialist literature. Especially when attacking the Left, those
organisations collaborate openly with the police and army. We have
here a curious concurrence. On the one hand fundamentalism is
targeted by the state for acts of terrorism against the public order.
On the other hand fundamentalism is supported by the state as a force
of terror against the working class and socialism. Muslim extremism
is an essential instrument in the counter-revolution.

The parallel with the Middle East policy of the White House and
reactionary Arab regimes is obvious. It suffices to remember the
origins of 'super-terrorist' Osama bin Laden, namely as a
CIA-supported 'freedom fighter' against the Stalinist regime in
Afghanistan. So the imperialists and the state use a puppet to clean
up the mess in their political warfare, but then the puppet grows
stronger and starts to turn against its own master as a
consequence of the same imperialism. Even more so, imperialism
and the concomitant state repression create a mass base of unrest and
hate against the government and the imperialists. Because of the
failure of secular Arab nationalism and the betrayal of the Stalinist
leadership, fundamentalism became in the Middle East, regrettably,
the sole organised mass movement that gives an expression to those
anti-imperialist feelings, be it in a very deformed manner(6).

Although in Indonesia fundamentalism still doesn't have this mass
base, the soil is made fertile by the socio-economic crisis of
capitalism, the ongoing anti-socialist tactics of the state and the
imperialist drive towards a 'clash of civilisations'. In the last few
weeks, Muslim groups have rallied in Jakarta and other cities to
protest the attack against Afghanistan and generally to condemn the
blaming of Islam for terrorism. Although not all these groups are
extremist, it is beyond doubt that the fundamentalists are
capitalising on the imperialist aggression and the anti-Islam
campaign by the majority of the bourgeois media. The justified
condemnation of the American offensive by broad layers of Indonesian
society has already pushed Megawati to openly reject the air raids,
thereby weakening Washington's international alliance against
terrorism. But in the absence of a strong labour leadership that puts
forward class-based internationalist demands, the general mood is one
of religious fervour instead of anti-imperialism.

On the other hand it would be dangerous to exaggerate the
situation. Contrary to what the Western media and all sorts of
think-thanks (such as Stratfor) seem to indicate, Indonesia is far
from being taken over by the fundamentalists. They still lack a
serious social base. As soon as they face the resolute action of the
working class and the students outside the factory or the
neighbourhood, they rapidly disintegrate. We can draw this conclusion
from recent historical precedents.

When in November 1998 the military organised the extreme-right
Islamic Pam Swakarsa militias to counter the student demonstration
they were forced to withdraw them after the first skirmishes. Rapidly
many of the urban kampung(7) of Jakarta became no entry zones for
those armed fundamentalist groups of lumpenised youth. Most of the
Pam Swakarsa militiamen ended killed by the youth of those
neighbourhoods. The military who had announced the presence of 30,000
of them to help to keep order, feared a general backlash and decided
to take them out. June 2001 in Yogyakarta, the capital of Central
Java, something similar happened to the Ka'bah youth movement (the
mentioned GPK). After months of trying to terrorise poor
neighbourhoods, the local population supporting the PDI-P organised
themselves in antifascist committees with the help of some student
activists and gave the GPK people literally a deadly hammering which
they still remember.

Although fundamentalist protests were manifold during the last
period, they nevertheless mobilised relatively small numbers of
people, in most demonstrations no more than 1.000. Only one time in
Jakarta there were more than 10.000 protesters against the war, yet
not all of them fundamentalists. Before the war against Afghanistan
the 2 largest Muslim organisations, Nahdlatul Ulama (40 million
members) and Muhammadiyah (28 million), indeed threatened to call for
Jihad if the U.S. would attack Afghanistan, but they were very quick
to say that they don't mean a holy war by that, but just a
non-violent effort to defend Islam. In the end when the war broke
out, their position was even more moderate.

What concerns politics, based on the 1999 elections the political
landscape is dominated by the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle
(PDI Perjuangan) which received 199 seats, the Golkar Party with 167
seats, the PKB with 38 seats, the PPP with 33 seats and the National
Mandate Party (PAN) which got 19 seats. Neither of these parties can
be considered fundamentalist. The strongest fundamentalist parties
are the Crescent Star Party (PBB) and the Justice Party (PK), both of
which grabbed just one seat, not what one could call a
'fundamentalist threat'. It is true that the PPP is a conservative
Muslim party &endash; which is not the same as fundamentalist,
although it can develop to one &endash; that wants to introduce the
sharia (Islam law) in Indonesia. But when Vice-President
Hamzah Haz of the PPP recently tried so, all the other main parties
voted against, including the political voice of Nahdlatul Ulama, the
PKB of former President Wahid. The other known politician sometimes
categorised as fundamentalist is Amien Rais, the speaker of
Indonesia's People's Consultative Assembly (MPR), the top legislative
body. His party PAN, the political voice of Muhammadiyah, is allied
with the fundamentalist parties PBB and PK in the so-called Central
Axis. By the way, those of you who remember the Western news around
the time of Suharto's fall, will know Rais used to be the favourite
of the Western bourgeoisie and media. He is indeed also known to be a
bourgeois reformer and as such opportunist enough to look for his own
masses, in casu conservative Muslims including fundamentalist
fractions. Again, his opportunism does not make him a fundamentalist,
although domestic and international developments can steer him in
that direction in the future. So given the fact that the
absolute majority of Indonesian Muslims are moderate practitioners of
their religion, that there are no fundamentalist politicians with a
mass base and that every top-level opportunist will think twice in
the current world situation before converting himself to
fundamentalism, we can safely conclude that for the moment there is
no threat for a fundamentalist regime in Indonesia.

Of course this is our short-term perspective, because it is clear
that fundamentalism is generally on the rise in Indonesia. If the
crisis keeps on festering &endash; and it will &endash;, if the
bourgeois politicians can't offer a strategy out of the crisis
&endash; and they won't &endash;, if the military in its bid to power
does not crush the fundamentalists &endash; together with the labour
movement &endash;, and most importantly if the workers leadership
does not offer a real, socialist alternative to the masses, then one
can be damn sure that Indonesia will have a fundamentalist regime in
the future.

American Anxiety and Generosity

The U.S. is fully aware of the threat posed to its interests in
the region by an ascending fundamentalism in the largest Muslim
country of the world. Even before the S11 disaster in New York and
Washington, a new report about Southeast Asia(8) by the Council on
Foreign Relations referred to "the spectre of politicised Islam" in
Indonesia. The rebellious province Aceh is mentioned as a particular
example, since important sections of the GAM (the Free Aceh Movement)
want to declare an independent Muslim state. The report further
states that the same spectre also threatens "the lower ranks of the
army" and even "the central government". Also some weeks before the
terrorist attack on the U.S., Robert Zoellick, the U.S. trade
representative to Jakarta, and James Kelly, the U.S. assistant
secretary of state for East Asia and Pacific Affairs warned that
there are links from Osama bin Laden to militants in Indonesia and
Southeast Asia. And recent reports even said that Osama bin Laden
might find refuge in Aceh.

In the past the U.S. supported fundamentalism as a force against
socialist-inspired regimes. But it turned out that fundamentalism
doesn't want to play the role originally assigned to it, namely as
agents of U.S. imperial interests. After its experiences in the
Middle East, Uncle Sam is haunted by the vision of Indonesia as a
stronghold of Muslim fundamentalists. That &endash; partly &endash;
explains why the American elite showers Indonesia with promises.
During their meeting, Bush promised the visiting President Megawati a
restoration of military aid and a total of US$657.4 million in
financial aid. The U.S. severed military ties with the TNI, the
Indonesian military, following mayhem in East Timor in September
1999. But now President Bush pledged that the United States would
lift its embargo on commercial sales of non-lethal defence equipment
to Indonesia. Of course this is only a first step.

The U.S. made several economic commitments too. Funds are provided
to three sectors of society: the state, the social sector and the
economy. An important part of the money goes to strengthening the
state apparatus as well as indoctrinating the masses. Concrete this
means that, according to a joint statement, Bush promised to help
Indonesia to increase civilian participation in defence and security
issues by allocating $400,000 to educate Indonesian civilians on
defence matters. He also promised to lend $10 million for the
training of Indonesian police in an effort to strengthen Indonesia's
"law enforcement capability". Further Bush pledged to work with
Congress to secure at least $130 million to help finance Indonesia's
legal and judicial reform in fiscal year 2002.

On top of that, the U.S. would donate $10 million to assist
refugees in Maluku, $5 million to rebuild destroyed schools and other
infrastructure in Aceh, and $2 million to assist East Timorese who
have chosen to stay in Indonesia. One can easily determine that
social aid is not the priority of Washington, a mere $17 million on a
total sum of $657.4 million. Nevertheless, the specific domain to
which social aid goes is also telling. By giving some small money to
help the victims of Jakarta's murderous policy towards restive
provinces, the White House not only tries to bring stability to the
fragmenting country, but even more so anticipates future critique of
its support for the Megawati government, namely that it boosts
military repression in those provinces.

On the economic front the U.S. is rather generous. Three U.S.
trade finance agencies -- the Export Import Bank (Exim), the Overseas
Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), and U.S. Trade and Development
Agency (TDA) -- would provide a total of $400 million to promote
trade and investment, especially in the oil and gas sector. Bush also
agreed to grant duty-free status worth $100 million to 11 Indonesian
products under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP). According
to U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick, the 11 products
exempted from duties are: Turpentine gum, tuna and skipjack, prepared
or preserved snails, copper ores and concentrates, sorbitol, four
types of plywood sheeting, rattan or palm leaf articles, and contact
lenses. As quoted in the Jakarta Post of September 21, Zoellick said
the purpose of the facilities was to "support President Megawati as
leader of the world's largest Muslim democracy and to help encourage
growth prospects for the Indonesian economy." By continually
referring to Indonesia as the largest Muslim country while displaying
the rewards for its allegiance, U.S. officials try to dampen
anti-American feelings inside the Muslim community. After steering
towards a clash of civilisations at the home front to intensify
patriotism, Washington now tries to contain the situation by the
classical technique of divide and rule.

Aside from that, the rewards are quite substantial compared with
the normal attitude of the imperialists. It seems the Bush
administration has big plans for Indonesia. Indeed, the recent talks
between the two countries' leaders go further than a global war
against terrorism.

This is clearly understood by the Indonesian bureaucracy. Dewi
Fortuna Anwar, an adviser of former President Habibie, said for
instance that Indonesia's support for the global war against
terrorism was not the main reason why the U.S. heaped promises of aid
to Megawati. Cited in the Jakarta Post of September 22, Dewi gave
three long-term considerations behind the promises. First, Indonesia
has a very important role to play in the Southeast Asian region. So
the U.S. does not want to see a weak Indonesia. Second, the U.S.
wants to help smoothen the transition process toward democracy in
Indonesia. Third, to protect U.S. interests in Indonesia, as there
are many U.S. companies operating there. These three reasons capture,
in the usual evasive and polished language of bureaucrats, the
long-term meanings of the reinvigorated alliance between the U.S. and
Indonesia.

A Battle for Hegemony in the Pacific Rim

Those three reasons are also present in the mentioned report by
the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) about what the Bush
administration should be doing in the region(9). Under the title
The United States and Southeast Asia: A Policy Agenda for the New
Administration, Dov Zakheim drafted a report for his boss Defence
Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who in his turn uses it to advice
President Bush. Dov Zakheim is a Reagan-era Pentagon planner and now
one of Bush's Under-Secretaries of Defence. Between working for
Reagan and Bush Jr., he was a lobbyist for weapons manufacturers like
McDonnell Douglas (now part of Boeing), promoting arms sales to Saudi
Arabia, Israel and elsewhere. And nearly one-third of the report's
27-member panel is made up of corporate representatives, including
Exxon-Mobil and baked-goods giant Sara Lee, both of which have
extensive investments in Indonesia.

In the report are implied two key recommendations: strengthen U.S.
military presence and market-oriented reform. Southeast Asia is
described as a "troubling landscape of political turbulence and
economic fragility". Therefor the report recommends that the "highest
American priority should still be assigned to maintaining regional
security", as to keep the region "free of domination by any hegemonic
power". Further, the CFR describes the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN) as "a nascent security community", and pleads for "a
constructive U.S.-ASEAN response to an emerging China". Since
Indonesia is identified as "the region's most important state", one
can imagine the content of the talks between Bush and Megawati. The
fact that he invited her in late July directly after she assumed
office and prior to the terrorist attacks, proves that Washington
already had big plans for Indonesia that go further than fighting
terrorism.

Indeed, the U.S. sees its hegemony in the Pacific challenged by a
resilient China. As a consequence Bush relabelled China from a
"strategic partner" to a "strategic competitor". In the aftermath of
the spy plane incident last April, we already stated that "at every
step, China's vital interests in Asia clash with those of the United
States. The contradictions have been manifested in a series of
incidents that have hampered the establishment of normal relations
between the two countries. There was a serious clash over the Tien an
Men Square massacre in 1989. In 1996 there was the crisis over the
lobbing of Chinese missiles close to Taiwan. In 1999, there was the
crisis over the American bombing of the Chinese embassy in
Yugoslavia. Given the existence of conflicting interests in a whole
series of areas, incidents like these will continue to occur at
regular intervals. (É)

"Above all, the problem of Taiwan, which Beijing still regards as
a rebel province which must rejoin the Motherland, remains as an
ulcer that poisons relations. Washington is pledged to come to the
aid of Taiwan in the event of hostilities, and there is a vocal
pro-Taiwan lobby in Congress, especially in the ranks of Mr. Bush's
party. There is a lot of bluff on both sides. It is not at all clear
that the US could defend Taiwan successfully against an all-out
attack from China. But the threat of US military intervention is
always present, and it is doubtful that Beijing would want to take
the risk. But the situation remains explosive. Both China and Taiwan
are arming to the teeth. Washington continues to arm Taiwan - which
recently held full-scale military manoeuvres, obviously directed
against China - with the most modern weaponry. The Taiwanese are
pressing the Americans to equip their armed forces with the latest
missile defence systems - a prospect that enrages the Chinese. (É)

"With every passing day, China is expanding her economic and
military power. This has important long-term implications for Asia
and the world. Although it suits the ruling Bureaucracy in Beijing to
seek a modus vivendi with Washington as a means of obtaining the
technological know-how and capital it needs to build up its economy,
it is under no illusions that, sooner or later, a clash with America
is inevitable. For the present, the incident of the spy plane is
closed, and China has won on points. But in the future there will be
new flash points in the struggle of China and America to dominate
this decisive part of the globe. (É)

"The development of explosive contradictions in the Pacific is
shown by the arms race that affects most countries in the region.
China itself is busy increasing its military strength. It has
recently announced an increase of 18 percent on military expenditure.
This is a big increase on the 10 percent increases of the past
period, which themselves caused alarm among China's neighbours.(10)"

Containing the Chinese Dragon

Most intelligence estimates suggest China will be unable to
present the United States with a major military challenge until at
least 2020. By that time Washington wants the ability to counter
Beijing with a tight, multilevel arrangement between the region's
major military powers as to deter aggression from Beijing and
preserve its own hegemony in the Pacific Rim. During a visit to
Australia in late July, U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and
Secretary of State Colin Powell proposed a multilateral security
relationship between the United States and its three main Pacific
allies: Australia, South Korea and Japan. Until now U.S. military
ties with these countries have been bilateral, separate
state-to-state relations between the U.S. and each of these allies.
But today Washington feels the need for deeper co-operation between
them to contain the Chinese dragon and therefor tries to organise a
multilateral alliance around its imperial interests. According to the
strategic think-thank Stratfor "the next logical steps to increase
security links will be agreements on weapons and communications
interoperability, more joint exercises and perhaps agreements to
expand access to one another's military bases(11)." Also Singapore is
since the mid-1990s steadily building up its armed forces with the
help of the United States. This "modernising of Singapore's armed
forces is transforming it into a key link in the security chain that
the United States is building around China(12)."

And even though the White House is rethinking its relationship to
ASEAN &endash; because in the late 1990s ASEAN has included Stalinist
Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, plus Chinese ally Myanmar, thereby
drifting away from its 1967 founding motive, i.e. containing China
and the Communist insurgency in Asia(13) &endash; Indonesia is as
"the region's most important state" lined-up in the frontline of
Washington's new geopolitical positioning in the Pacific Rim.

Indonesia's waters are the most strategic in the world. Indonesia
is the gateway between the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean. From
the Straits of Malacca eastward to the Banda Sea, it is impossible to
pass between the Pacific and Indian Oceans without passing through
the coastal waters of Indonesia. U.S. naval forces and trading
vessels constantly sail through these shipping lanes. The Ombai-Wetar
Straits in East Nusa Tenggara are the main Indian-Pacific Ocean
nuclear submarine passage. East Asia, particularly U.S. allies Japan
and South Korea, is heavily dependent on the flow of oil from the
Persian Gulf, which much pass through Indonesia's sea lanes. On top
of that, Asian exports to Europe have to be shipped through
Indonesian waters. Since these are all coastal waters, there is no
need for a huge navy to control the passage of merchant ships. Small
patrol craft and land based coastal artillery and missiles would be
quite sufficient to interdict the movement of vessels. Indonesia is a
strategic country for its vast natural resources like oil, gold and
copper too. In all these fields, American multinationals are
operating. Therefor, if Indonesia would disintegrate or, still worse,
come in the Chinese sphere of influence, America's multinationals and
political allies would face serious problems.

Candidly, China is already expanding its influence in the South
Pacific, which it traditionally considers as its backyard. During
Wahid's presidency, Bejing has sought to develop ties with Jakarta,
but until now has failed to gain a real breakthrough in its relations
with a regime that for the last 37 years has been a staunch opponent
of Communism, or Maoism for that sake. Because of that, China's
ruling caste has switched its policy to separatist movements, aside
from courting smaller powers in the South Pacific like Papua New
Guinea and Tonga(14). Recently, they held talks with separatists from
Indonesia's eastern-most province of Irian Jaya, the Free Papua
Movement. The aim is clear. Bejing wants to gain leverage in this
strategic area to counterbalance U.S. hegemony and in preparation of
a seemingly inevitable clash with its rival. Through its dealings
with South Pacific nations, Beijing can turn political influence into
military capability in the event of a crisis.

Washington for its part would prefer Indonesia holds together.
Stability is a necessary condition to counter China's aspirations in
the Pacific. But since the Asian crisis and the 1998 revolution
against dictator Suharto, Indonesia has been the region's prime
example of instability: ethnic and religious violence in Ambon,
Kalimantan and Sulawesi; separatist movements in East Timor, Aceh and
Irian Jaya; labour unrest in the whole country, with major eruptions
in Surabaya, Bandung and the Jabotabek area; a parliament squabbling
about the impeachment of former President Wahid; clashes between
supporters and opponents of Wahid; student revolts; fights between
police and army; bomb attacks on churches and shopping malls; fuel
riots. Not exactly what one would call stability.

Bourgeois Democracy and the Military

In the past, the army and its strongman Suharto ruthlessly held
Indonesia together and assured stability. At that time Washington
fully supported this bloody dictatorship as a bulwark against
Communism. But when Indonesian troops were implicated in a militia
rampage ignited by East Timor's vote for independence in 1999, the
U.S. Congress responded to calls from the East Timorese and
international civil society by cutting U.S.-Indonesian military ties.
The so-called Leahy Amendment specified that the Indonesian military
should be called to account its abuses in East Timor, before the U.S.
can resume military relations. One of the major stumbling blocks for
the resumption of military ties was the lenient sentencing of six
East Timorese militiamen for the murder of three UN humanitarian
staff -- including an American -- in Indonesian West Timor September
2000.

In the immediate post-Cold War era, there could be no
justification to continue to support autocratic anti-Communist
regimes. Moreover, the conjunction of capitalist hegemony on a world
scale and revolting masses in the Third World meant that the
imperialists could play the card of 'democracy', of course as the
most weak and feeble derivative of what this word actually means. By
linking 'democracy' and 'good governance' to IMF liberal reform, the
imperialists tried on the one hand to wipe out the memories of their
sordid past of support for repressive regimes and blame all
maleficent impacts on these regimes themselves, while on the other
hand driving up the capitalist plunder of the poor nations. Because
during the 1990s there was no immediate threat from a new socialist
counter-movement, formal bourgeois democracy was the ideal demand to
legitimise capitalist rule.

It is the reminiscence of this strategy of containing mass revolt
that still dictates Washington's lip service to democracy,
although we have entered a qualitatively different stage of
history. The honeymoon of the post-Cold War period is over, the
declared New World Order by George Bush Senior has proven to be a
World Disorder, the Pax Americana can not even provide security and
peace on its own soil. American hegemony is challenged by secondary
powers like China, Russia, the EU, India and Brazil, calling for a
'multi-polar world', while an anti-capitalist movement is building up
in the hearth of imperialism itself. In the Third World anti-American
ideologies are spreading in very different forms: right wing
fundamentalism in the Arab world and left wing populism(15) in Latin
America. As a consequence Washington is redefining its position to
the world and more in particular the kind of allies it needs. In
official reports there is a remarkable shift from a (rhetorical)
reference to 'democracy' towards the term 'stability'. As a policy
this means that the White House will prefer more authoritarian
regimes with a greater role for the military.

That is not to say the world will see in the near future a general
return to clear-cut military dictatorships like the one in Pakistan.
In most countries, the people as well as the military are reluctant
to return to that kind of regimes. Add international opposition to
dictatorships and this option is ruled out for Washington, at least
for the moment. Rather what we are facing now is the rise of
so-called 'strong(wo)man-democracies', of which Megawati's Indonesia
is a prime example.

It is in this light that we have to consider the talks between
Washington and Jakarta. On the one hand the lip service to democracy
is still there. For instance, Bush described Indonesia's transition
to democracy as "one of the most significant developments of this
era." But then his words took a quite peculiar turn. In the same
joint statement by the presidents it is stated that "President Bush
recognised the important role of the Indonesian Military (TNI) as a
national institution and both leaders observed the importance of
military reform in Indonesia's democratic transition. In that regard,
the two presidents agreed to expand modest contacts and resume
regular meetings between their militaries to support Indonesia's
efforts at military reform and professionalism." Also, speaking at a
dinner hosted by the United States-Indonesia Society, Megawati said
the resumption of military ties would strengthen democracy in
Indonesia. "As in other democratic countries, the minimal role vested
in Indonesia's military establishment is that of protecting the
country's territorial integrity and political sovereignty. These two
things are essential in a democracy. A democracy cannot exist if its
territorial boundaries are changed or twisted at every turn."

From a vague reference to democracy, both leaders swiftly went to
the real issue, restoring military ties. For Washington an armed
Indonesia under the rule of Megawati and the TNI equals an ally
against China and, to a lesser extent, against fundamentalism. For
Jakarta such relation in the first place equals suppressing
secessionist movements ("protecting the country's territorial
integrity") and other opposition, like the labour movement and the
students. Towards fundamentalism the Indonesian establishment, as
said, has a more ambiguous position of using while containing.

This restoring of military ties is for imperialism all the more
urgent since Indonesia's military, the TNI, is "a far cry from the
nearly monolithic force that held Indonesia together and ruthlessly
destroyed the opponents of Suharto", as stated by Stratfor(16). In
the same article they explain that "for decades, the armed forces
ruthlessly held the republic together, but today intelligence
indicates the 300,000-man military is a mere shell of its former
self. And although the TNI is far stronger than any single rebellion,
it would have great difficulty putting down simultaneous outbreaks
across the country." Also, the Jakarta Post September 8, 2001 quoted
Minister of Defense Matori Abdul Djalil as saying "the two forces
[the Navy and Air Force] are still operating ships and planes that
are between 30 and 40 years old." So in order to have a strong ally,
the White House was already in June trying to persuade the Congress
to allow the resumption of ties. This was all the more urgent since
some factions in the Indonesian elite, like former President Wahid,
were starting to flirt with China.

Last August, the British ruling class through Foreign Minister
Bradshaw declared itself ready to restore arms sales to Indonesia,
after the European Union lifted its embargo. At that moment it became
clear that imperialism again favoured the TNI. On August 30 2001,
Agence France Presse reported that "Megawati's visit looms as a
campaign gathers pace for a renewal of US military links with
Indonesia, which the smart money says is emanating from the
Pentagon." And further "Congressional sources say administration
officials have already held discreet consultations on Capitol Hill on
just how much political latitude there is for a resumption of some
military ties." With the S11 terror attacks and the presence of
fundamentalist groups in Indonesia, the Bush administration has got
the ideal pretence to persuade the Congress. And in order to
accommodate Capitol Hill, Jakarta already has promised to establish a
human rights court to sentence those implicated in the killing of
East Timorese and UN staff.

Resurrecting the New Order

Under Megawati Indonesia will experience steady remilitarisation
instead of the very modest demilitarisation and democratisation of
the Habibie and Wahid administrations(17). To be clear, during the
last months of Wahid's reign the TNI was already coming back into
prominence, in the end helped by the president who in his power agony
tried to declare a state of emergency with the help of the army,
thereby offering them the most crucial role in deciding who was going
to be the country's leader. As their grip on Megawati is stronger,
they refused Wahid's offer. Megawati rewarded the TNI with four
Minister positions in her cabinet for retired generals, including
Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono as Co-ordinating Minister for Political and
Security Affairs. On top of that, the defence budget for 2002 is
raised by 18 %, in times that the government is cutting her social
expenses like oil and telephone subsidies. Although this increase
adjusted to the current inflation rate is still insufficient to give
the army back the strength it benefited under the Suharto regime, it
is nevertheless symptomatic of the budgetary and therefore political
priorities of this new government.

It is obvious that the Indonesian bureaucracy and military will
use the argument of 'a war against terrorism' to justify an even
stronger build-up of the state apparatus and a crackdown on all
opposition, like all other governments in the world for that matter.
Actually one could observe this trend before September 11. In
Indonesia's northern neighbour Malaysia, Prime Minister Mahathir said
on September 1 that Muslim militants are seeking to create an Islamic
union of states comprising Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines.
This warning is a part of his campaign against Islam extremism, which
the government claims is linked to its main political opposition, the
Parti Islam Se Malaysia. As part of its campaign, it has arrested
opposition forces under its internal security act, put heavy
restrictions on political demonstrations and threatened actions
against suspected anti-government organisations and leaders. By
alleging a region-wide threat from militant Islamists, Mahathir hopes
to counter domestic and foreign criticism of his opposition
crackdown. Both Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and
Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri discussed the
fundamentalist insurgence in the region with Mahathir during visits
in August, according to statements by Malaysia's foreign
minister(18).

The Megawati administration is indeed following the same script as
Mahathir under pretext of the global war against terrorism(19). For a
start, they are stepping up the repression of secessionist movements
in the provinces Aceh and West Papua, both rich in natural resources.
Recently the army murdered the leader of the Free Papua Movement
(OPM) Theys Eluay and Megawati made clear that every attempt to harm
the unity of Indonesia will be crushed by the security forces.
Notably the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) is a suitable victim of a
coalition against fundamentalism, since important factions in GAM
want to establish a Muslim state. In accordance with Mahathir's
analysis of an expanding network that seeks to create an Islamic
union of states, Jakarta has long expressed concerns that Islamic
separatists in Aceh are supplied through Malaysia. Furthermore GAM is
qualified as a terrorist organisation through alleged involvement in
the bombings in Jakarta. Nevertheless, these claims have not been
based on any demonstrable evidence, so it's clear that the central
elite is faking evidence to assure its control over the oil-rich Aceh
province. Besides, in Aceh itself the Christian minorities are not
being harassed, while in Java Christian churches and houses have been
burned.

Scott Burchill, a scholar of International Relations at Deakin
University in Australia, describes this terrifying repression as
follows. "About 6,000 automatic weapons were recently shipped by the
TNI to central Aceh, to further arm transmigrants there [who are]
already receiving training from the TNI's notorious Kopassus (special
forces). Kopassus trained and led the brutal militias of East Timor.
The Indonesian government would no doubt argue the training and
weapons are for self-defence. But to the Acehnese, these ethnically
Javanese militias are just a variation on the thugs that were trained
and armed by the TNI in East Timor. (É)

"The national police Mobile Brigade (Brimob) also has a high
presence. Yet Brimob is hardly 'civilianising' the conflict. In any
other country, Brimob would be called the Civil Guard, or the
domestic army. I even saw a Brimob post north of the Lhokseumawe, the
troubled and violent town near the valuable Arun natural gas field,
designated as 'Hunters'. As one TNI Lieutenant-General told me in
Jakarta, Brimob had "problems with discipline". Unfortunately, the
vast majority of the people hunted and killed by Brimob, and the TNI,
are not GAM but civilians. Officially more than 1200 people have been
killed this year. Unofficially, including those who have
'disappeared', the figure is much higher, perhaps double. And this
does not take into account the persistent use of rape, torture and
beatings to attempt to compel compliance. Aceh is less a discontented
part of Indonesia and more, like East Timor was, a territory under
brutal military occupation. That effectively all Brimob and TNI in
Aceh are from elsewhere in the archipelago confirms this impression
of occupation(20)."

Nevertheless British Foreign Minister Ben Bradshaw said Britain is
ready to resume sales of weapons to Indonesia, saying that the
British government has accepted the assurances from the TNI that
these arms would not be used for internal repression, including in
Aceh. "The assurances they [TNI] gave us are reliable," he said as
quoted by the Jakarta Post of August 29. We can conclude from this
that he is either a naïve idiot who is used by the TNI and
British arms exporters, and therefor incapable of leading a country.
Or he is a murderous hypocrite who serves the interests of
imperialism and their collaborators in the Third World, and thereby
an adversary of labour.

In a move to counter military power over her policy, Megawati said
October 5 during the Indonesian Military's (TNI) 56th anniversary
celebration that the country's military should separate itself from
politics. This move is dictated by the pressure of the masses that
support her party PDI-P because of its anti-military and anti-New
Order rhetoric, as well as the pressure of international
pro-democracy forces. Megawati definitely wants to avoid the image of
her being a military puppet. Therefor she wants to pursue dialogue in
Aceh, apart from military intervention, as a means to resolve the
conflict. And although she has succeeded for the moment in blocking
the deployment of 15,000 extra troops in the province, in the end the
president succumbed to the wishes of the generals in agreeing not to
meet GAM members. "The army would prefer Ibu Mega to take a stronger
line against the Acehnese rather than to give in to their demands,
which makes it appear that we are weak," said a two-star general
quoted by the Straits Times(21). But he was clear that differences
over tackling the Aceh problem would have little bearing on the
military's "symbiotic" relationship with the new President unless she
prosecuted generals for human-rights abuses. Despite pressure from
important factions in PDI-P to expose the military's atrocities,
Megawati has refused to publicly attack the TNI. According to an army
source "Ibu Mega, unlike Gus Dur, seems to better understand the
sensitivities of the military." Sukarno's daughter indeed is in the
grip of the generals, still more than her predecessor Wahid was.

In a further move to regain its control over society, the TNI
proposes to establish a new anti-terrorist agency. Indonesian
Military chief Adm. Widodo launched the idea at a hearing with the
House of Representatives, with the backing of retired military and
police officers, including those in the House of Representatives. In
that way they try to resurrect Kopkamtib(22), the New Order's dreaded
internal security agency (in 1988 renamed Bakorstanas(23),). Only in
2000 this institution of terror was disbanded under pressure of the
masses. As in the past, the new 'anti-terrorist' agency would allow
widespread human rights abuses to be carried out by the state in the
name of security.

This would have enormous implications for the working class. The
main task of Kopkamtib was suppressing labour in the name of national
stability. During the early 1980s, Admiral Sudomo as the most
notorious chief of Kopkamtib placed industrial disputes under
complete control of the military(24). In 1981 he ordered direct
military intervention in labour disputes. Later, in 1984, Sudomo as
Minister of Manpower (!) banned all strike action and even collective
labour agreements because these contravened with the principles of
Pancasila Industrial Relations, the state ideology concerning
production relations. Only at the end of the 20th century, the
workers and students were able to smash this brutal system of
oppression. But after a few years we already see the rhetoric of
imperialism and Indonesian politics shifting back to 'national
stability'. On the basis of 'the war against terrorism', capital and
the state are reintroducing their old methods of repression. An
anti-terrorist agency is just the beginning.

Social Disaster in the Make: the Unfolding Slump

The Indonesian economy is in shambles. Since the Asian crisis of
1997-98, Indonesia hasn't been able to achieve even a superfluous
restoration like countries as South Korea and Malaysia did on the
basis of the world economic boom. Public debt (owed by the state) now
stands at US$134 billion, representing 104% of Indonesia's Gross
Domestic Product. Indonesia spends 23 times as much government
revenue repaying debt as it does providing health services.

According to the United Nation's World Investment Report 2001,
foreign investors continue to stay away from Indonesia(25). Foreign
Direct Investment (FDI), i.e. investment in production capacity by
multinational firms, is in the era of imperialism probably the main
engine of growth. It was investment by Japan, the U.S. and the early
Tiger economies (Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore) in the
second generation Tigers (Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and the
Philippines) that drove the Asian Miracle of the late 1980s until the
mid 1990s. In 1997, at the height of the boom, FDI in Indonesia
peaked at $4.7 billion. But the flow of foreign direct investment
dropped to minus $0.4 billion in 1998, meaning that foreign capital
outflow exceeded foreign capital inflow by that amount. In 2000 the
FDI figure in Indonesia was minus $4.6 billion, an increase from
minus $2.7 billion in 1999. Indonesia's FDI index now ranks 134 out
of 135 countries monitored by UNCTAD, or second from the bottom
preceding Yemen.

Cited in the Jakarta Post of September 19 2001, economist Djisman
Simanjuntak of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies
stated that "[The negative FDI figure] was caused by foreign
companies in Indonesia paying off their debts and one or two
companies pulling out of the country." He further said that the
mid-1997 economic crisis and the ensuing political uncertainties had
caused foreign investors to look elsewhere. Also J. Michael Stinson,
senior vice-president of Conoco, a company that has interests in the
gas fields of Riau, claims: "Indonesia will be one of the best places
to put money if you have a stable and predictable tax environment,
law respecting human resources and workers. Then it will be conducive
for foreign investment." (quoted by the Jakarta Post September 25,
2001) In the bourgeois New Speak "law respecting human resources and
workers" simply refer to a docile labour force. Since only
authoritarian states adhere to this criterion, we find no surprise in
seeing China, Vietnam and Myanmar as new magnets for investment in
the Pacific region.

Since the 1998 revolution, Indonesia has indeed become the scene
of mass unrest and upheaval. In the aftermath of the S11 inferno and
the war on Afghanistan, the situation will further tend to worsen.
Investors are already fleeing the country following threats by Muslim
extremists, which had a devastating impact on the Indonesian rupiah
falling past 10,000 to the dollar for the first time since July 31.
After Megawati came to power in late July, the currency rose by as
much as 25 percent from the 11,300 low against the dollar during
Wahid's tumultuous demise. Now the new government's honeymoon is
over.

Moreover, Indonesia's exports are set to decline due to the
recession in the world market and especially the U.S., Indonesia's
biggest export market. Purchase orders for Indonesian steel pipe
products from the U.S. stopped when the U.S. economy plunged into
recession, according to the secretary general of the Indonesian Steel
Pipe Manufacturers Association (The Jakarta Post October 26, 2001).
He also predicted that no shipments would take place in the first
quarter of next year, with the U.S. economy still expected to be in
the doldrums. About 70 percent of the country's total steel pipe
exports of 40,000 tons last year went to the U.S. market. Also the
Indonesian Textile Association (API) said it expected the country's
2001 textile export to decline by 25 percent from US$8.2 billion last
year. "The local textile industry is very sensitive to the slowdown
in the U.S economy because about 26.3 percent of its export goes to
this country," API executive director Indra Ibrahim said in The
Jakarta Post of October 20, 2001. Textile is the country's major
non-natural resource export product, and the sector employs a great
number of workers. Indra said that the prospect for 2002 remained
gloomy as textile companies had yet to receive orders for
January-April shipment, which in normal times were usually made
starting October. Further, API informed that there is a growing list
of local textile companies complaining of cancellation orders from
the American buyers in the aftermath of the S11 terrorist attacks on
New York and Washington, which deepens the world's economic crisis.

In order to survive, companies are passing the crisis on to the
back of the workers. Many companies already have cut workdays to five
days a week from six and shifts to one shift from two and even three
shifts a day. Although workers resent working 50 or more hours a
week, they badly need the income because of their starvation wages.
The next step is mass lay-offs, in a country that is already flooded
by 40 million un- or underemployed workers. API chairman Benny
Sutrisno predicts that the workforce in the textile industry alone
will be cut by 100,000 workers (The Jakarta Post November 7).
Especially unionised workers are targeted. With the crisis
capitalists use economic reasons to justify to lay-off militant union
members first and thereby break the backbone of organised labour.
November 15 the Jakarta Post noted a case in the industrial zone of
Tangerang where textile 8 workers were detained for violating
Criminal Code Articles 170 and 160 on vandalism and incitement to
violence. These are typical laws used by the New Order to repress
labour protest and union organising. And again now those 8 women who
take the lead in defending their rights as workers are arrested as
ordinary criminals. All they and their comrades asked was severance
payment from the company because the management dismissed 250
workers, so according to Indonesian law they owe them severance
money. That the bosses picked 250 workers who recently joined the
Karya Utama Labor Union Federation, is probably 'pure coincidence'.
Of the union members of Garteks, the garment and textiles sector of
SBSI, already 220 lost their job at PT Hyang Do Tama in Tangerang,
300 at PT Senang in Karang Anyar Solo, 850 in Sragen, Solo, just to
mention some examples.

In a first phase, those massive dismissals will weaken the
position of the unions by causing a decline in membership and
presence on the shop floor. Given a correct perspective by the union
leadership and activists, this quantitative decline can be superseded
by a qualitative leap in consciousness. It is of absolute importance
that workers know capitalism is causing their suffering and the chaos
in society. Conquests by the working class are always temporary under
capitalism, at the corner of every economic boom stands a crisis that
will be paid by the workers. Therefor the workers need a clear
program that goes further than economic demands and gives a
perspective of how they can transform society. The bosses' attack
will surely prepare the stage for further instability and revolts.
The last years Indonesia has experienced an unseen wave of strikes
and union organising, culminating in the June labour protests of more
than one hundred thousand workers in Bandung, Surabaya, Jakarta and
other major cities . Compared with these labour protests the
fundamentalist demonstrations shrink to nothing. The bourgeoisie and
the state are afraid for yet other worker eruptions, knowing that the
workers won't give away their recent conquests and that in the
background looms the spectre of socialism(27). The Indonesian
Revolution has barely started.

The Corporate Take-Over of Indonesia

As explained, Indonesia is a strategic country plus it is host to
huge investments by multinationals. During her U.S. tour President
Megawati spoke at the 2001 Houston Energy Conference, which was
attended by a number of leading U.S. businesses including Texaco,
Exxon-Mobil, Freeport McMoRan, Unocal, Elpaso Energy International,
Halliburton, Anadarco and Conoco. All of them have considerable
investments in Indonesia. For example the U.S. mining company
Freeport McMoRan has build the world's largest gold mine in West
Papua and also began exploiting its plentiful copper resources. Such
'sunken' capital has to be protected. And in these turbulent times
only one force can preserve U.S. economic interests: the army.

The TNI itself depends largely on investment and the economy, as
it receives only 30 percent of its funds from the state budget. The
rest comes from the military's own extensive business operations. And
because the military depends on a healthy capitalist economy, it will
go to possibly extreme lengths to ensure national stability. Their
interests therefor converge with those of foreign capitalists. The
latter will thus give the military tacit support to crack down on
unrest, as well as look the other way should the armed forces resort
to extreme measures, including human rights violations. To be clear,
this not at all new. This year Exxon-Mobil was sued in U.S. federal
court under the 200-year-old Alien Tort Claims Act for responsibility
for serious human rights abuses, including murder and torture,
committed by the TNI in connection with providing security for its
operations in Aceh.

Such violations are for Big Business by no means a reason to stop
supporting its ally in the archipelago. The US-ASEAN Business
Council, a private body made up of the heads of corporations with
interests in Southeast Asia &endash; including Exxon-Mobil,
Freeport-McMoRan, Boeing and Coca-Cola &endash; released a report in
February urging the Bush administration to "lift the embargo on
military equipment and training while re-establishing direct
military-to-military contacts." And, as said above, the Council on
Foreign Relations, which also argues for renewed military ties, is
such a capitalist lobby too. The CFR is one of the main actors in the
network of secret international negotiations and decisions, and used
to be the home base of the infamous former U.S. Secretary of Foreign
Affairs, Henry Kissinger.

While courting the TNI, the American bourgeoisie further conquers
Indonesia's markets and means of production by imposing draconian IMF
measures. The CFR report advises the U.S. to "promote market-oriented
economic reform, technology-driven development, and measures for
poverty alleviation." The road to poverty alleviation is to "assist
the International Monetary Fund." And this in a time when even a
staunch propagandist of capitalism and free trade like Jagdish
Bhagwati &endash; who is nonetheless a member of the CFR &endash;
criticised the IMF for its disastrous imperialist role in the Asian
crisis(28). Recently the IMF has pushed the Indonesian government for
yet another hike in oil, electricity and telephone prices by cutting
in government subsidies. That fuelled the June protests because
Indonesia's poor saw their living standards tumble once again.
Several of the arrested activists are still in jail since they
distributed leaflets to the masses. Meanwhile the IMF at last has
approved two months ago to disburse a next US$395 million loan
tranche to the country, after cunningly waiting for months with the
disbursement to bring about the fall of the unpredictable Wahid
government.

The U.S. imperialists wield enormous economic power over the
archipelago. The U.S. takes more than 25 percent of Indonesia's
exports, it's one of the largest foreign investors and commands the
biggest influence both in the International Monetary Fund and the
World Bank. Nevertheless such instruments of imperialist pressure
stay external and are therefor not enough for complete economic
domination. The U.S. bourgeoisie had to gain a firm foothold
inside the Indonesian government. And that's exactly what they
got with Megawati's new cabinet. The current stable of advisers has
close ties to international lending institutions and US corporations.
Finance Minister Boediono is the former director of the World Bank's
Indonesia office and worked for Bank of America in Jakarta. Laksamana
Sukardi, the new minister of state-owned enterprises, is a former
Citibank executive. These choices demonstrate Megawati's commitment
to creating a 'favourable climate for investment'.

From Tragedy to Farce and Beyond

The parallel with the 1960s is striking. At that time imperialism
was arguing for "stability" and "containing China" too. Under
Sukarno, Indonesia had become a leading force in the non-aligned
movement, a major impediment to US efforts to "roll back Communism"
and to isolate China in particular. And from the second half of the
1940s onwards Communism was again on the rise in Indonesia, pushing
the nationalist Sukarno to the left. A Communist (or even Stalinist)
Indonesia would have posed a far bigger problem to world capitalism
than the victorious struggle in Vietnam. Therefor the U.S. backed,
after a failed attempt in 1958, the Suharto-led 1965 coup against
Sukarno and the PKI, the Indonesian Communist Party. Last summer the
CIA, as well as action officers at the U.S. State Department, have
prevented the official release of a study by state historians about
the involvement of Washington in the massacre of up to 1 million
Communists and other Left wing Indonesians in 1965-66. This study is
largely compiled of quotes from official state documents that were
declassified in 1998 and 1999. Nevertheless the CIA could stall the
release of the documents and called the books back(29).

Some journalists suggested that this move was inspired by the
(correct) CIA assumption that Sukarno's daughter Megawati would come
to power. According to these journalists it would have been bad for
diplomatic relations if it was proven that Washington had a hand in
the murder of Megawati's father. We think Megawati knows very well
what happened at the time. But for her this is of no concern now she
has the power, just as she refuses to investigate the brutal attack
by the New Order on her party PDI-P in 1996. Megawati is clearly not
prepared to fight the New Order nor its patron, U.S. imperialism. She
would love to see herself in the position of Dictator Suharto. So the
release of the document just would be inconvenient at a time both
parties want to restore military ties. And that was exactly what
happened when Sukarno and the PKI were toppled by the coup of General
Suharto. After they gave Suharto a leg up, the U.S. and Britain
re-established military trade and joint exercises with Indonesia,
while launching a world-wide campaign to clear the name of their
vassal(30).

And just like now, "the IMF, the World Bank, Indonesian
technocrats trained in the United States, and U.S. government
advisers wrote the rules for the new economic order.(31)" Under
Suharto an economic team called the Berkeley Mafia, because of their
education at the Berkeley University of California, rewrote
Indonesia's investment laws to create indeed a 'favourable climate
for investment', after which foreign capital soon returned to exploit
the cheap and laborious working class, crippled by the annihilation
of their ranks and leadership. Award-winning journalist John Pilger
depicts the filthy role of foreign capitalists in a stunning
documentary on Indonesia and globalisation, which was broadcast by
the British TV-station Channel 4. Referring to the massacre of
Communists in 1965-66, John Pilger himself states that "the seeds of
globalisation were planted in the bloodbath. In 1967 the Time Life
Corporation sponsored a conference in Switzerland [the Indonesian
Investment Conference] that planned the corporate take-over of
Indonesia. It was attended by the most powerful businessmen in the
world, such as David Rockefeller, the giants of Western capitalism
were represented, the oil companies, the banks, General Motors, ICI,
British-American Tobacco, Lehman Brothers, American Express,
Siemens,É(32)" What is happening today is just a further elaboration
of that corporate take-over of Indonesia, with the same sort of
liberal technocrats in government and a return to unconcealed
capitalist support for the TNI.

Of course that is not to say that Indonesia has entered a totally
similar period as the New Order, and even less to contend that the
brief Wahid interlude is similar to the great era of anti-colonial
struggle during Sukarno's reign. For one thing, the balance of forces
today is quite different from the one in the past. During the two
decades after the Second World War and Indonesia's independence, the
worker and peasant masses fought an heroic battle against
imperialism, be it Dutch, Japanese, British or American. Maybe the
main difference with the struggle today was that it was highly
ideological. Anti-colonial nationalism and socialism led the
struggle. The PKI, the Indonesian Communist Party, developed into the
biggest Communist party in the capitalist world and the third one in
the entire world (after the Russian and the Chinese). In order to
counter-balance the power of the military the nationalist president
Sukarno had to lean on the PKI, thereby pushed to the left, providing
better labour laws and nationalising the Dutch industry. But as a
typical bonapartist Sukarno also kept on leaning on the army, for
instance by giving them positions in the government and the actual
control over the nationalised companies.

Since the PKI leadership under influence from Moscow and Bejing
adhered to the Stalinist Two-Stage Theory as opposed to the
experience of the Russian revolution where democratic and socialist
revolution were telescoped under the leadership of the working class,
they refused to take power. Instead they tried to complete the
national democratic revolution by relying on the so-called
progressive bourgeois which was represented in their eyes by Sukarno.
They failed to understand that no faction of the bourgeois in
Indonesia or in any other country could play any progressive role in
this epoch. The bourgeois class especially in the Third World is an
utterly reactionary class, even if it disguises itself with social
and anti-imperialist demagogy. Despite its mass base the PKI was
politically disarmed when the military with the help of Islamic
paramilitary groups unleashed an unprecedented orgy of violence
against the communist movement and the left in general. Paralysed by
their hope that Sukarno and his officers would protect them, the PKI
did not make any serious effort to struggle for power at this
decisive juncture of 1965. That was the only hope and only
perspective that could have galvanised the masses in joint action to
fight back reaction and start the process of the socialist revolution
in the archipelago(33). But it didn't happen and so the workers were
decapitated, literally. The PKI was drowned in blood.

The main weakness for the Indonesian workers and peasants today is
the absence of a mass-based socialist party, the so-called subjective
factor. Such a party can turn the new Indonesian Revolution into the
advantage of the toiling classes, and provided with a Marxist
leadership the masses in the mid-term can be able to take power.

Hic Rhodus, hic salta!

In fact, objectively the working class today is far stronger than
during the Old Order of Sukarno. In the 1950s the modern industrial
proletariat comprised a mere 500,000 workers, while the majority of
the working class was found on the plantations and in the
handicrafts. During the New Order the share of manufacturing in total
economic activity was drastically altered, especially since the
industrialisation drive starting in the mid-1980s. Because of the
collapse of the oil prices in the early 1980s, the New Order had to
redirect its economic policy to secure its balance-of-payments. In
the context of the international capitalist restructuring of industry
&endash; nowadays called 'globalisation' &endash; Indonesia became an
export platform providing low wage labour in a repressive system.
Notably after the major revaluation of the Japanese yen against the
U.S. dollar as a result of the 1985 Plaza Accord, Japanese
multinationals in a bid to stay competitive started to relocate
production capacity to low wage Southeast Asia, thereby expanding the
industrial proletariat in the region. Basing himself on a report of
the World Bank Vedi Hadiz stated that "in 1971 there was a total of a
mere 2.7 million people employed in the [manufacturing] sector, which
constituted 6.5 percent of the labour force. In 1980, the number of
workers in manufacturing had grown to 4.4 million, representing 8.5
percent of the total workforce. By 1990, however, there were 8.2
million people working in the manufacturing sector, representing 11.6
percent of Indonesia's labour force, indicating a slow, but fairly
steady growth.(34) " On the basis of the investment boom of the 1990s
the industrial proletariat now even has grown to represent 16 percent
of total workforce, while 39 percent works in the services, according
to the latest figures of the CIA(35).

In spite of the anti-labour tactics of the bourgeoisie and the
state, the power of the workers is bound to grow during this
revolutionary phase in Indonesian history. The disintegrating
archipelago has entered an era of crisis, revolution and
counter-revolution in which the working class is looking for a strong
leadership. Today more than ever, the question is one of socialism or
barbarism. Megawati's nationalist farce is in the process of being
unmasked while the bombs drop on Afghanistan. After Wahid, she is the
second 'progressive' bourgeois to be delegitimised in the eyes of the
people, of the 3 that came to the forefront during the fall of
Suharto (Wahid, Megawati and Rais). As a consequence of popular
criticism on her support for the American imperialist agenda,
Megawati has already been forced to take a distance from the
government's earlier position and to criticise the aggressive policy
of her liege Bush. Washington's accommodating and understanding
answer towards this 'treason' shows again what significance the
American ruling class attributes to keeping Megawati on the throne.
Not many statesmen are allowed to attack Uncle Sam's war on
Afghanistan without being reprimanded!

Megawati's policy will leave a vast vacuum of dissatisfaction
under the masses. Undoubtedly some confused lumpenproletarians will
make the step to the ultra right, to fundamentalism. But organised
labour can simply not make this step because they are harassed by
fundamentalist gangs, in their day to day experience they see that
Muslim extremism is a direct enemy of the working class. Imperialism
and the economic crisis are radicalising the minds of the workers,
most importantly those who are fighting to build a genuine workers
union. For the moment those unions are dominated by economistic(36)
and social democratic ideas under the influence of the Western labour
bureaucracy of the AFL-CIO (ACILS), the World Confederation of Labour
and a broad spectrum of labour based NGO's. At the same time a
broadening layer of workers is looking for more radical ideas since
they feel reformism is not bringing them any further. The injustice
of the war against Afghanistan is further politicising those workers.
This gives an opportunity to the Left and the Marxists in particular
to offer an explanation on class lines, to show the connection
between the imperialist war against Afghanistan and the exploitation
of Indonesian workers and peasants.

A revolutionary period always flows in ups and downs. With the S11
terror attacks it seems the Counter-Revolution has got a trump-card
to repress the masses and the Left. But this trump-card has proven to
be a poisoned gift. The Megawati government, i.e. the hand that has
to play the cards, is after a few months in power unexpectedly shaky.
The all-out social crisis has entered yet another stage of deepening
disintegration. To bolster business confidence Megawati is obliged to
use the whip of repression, which will inevitably lead to growing
discontent and resistance. Nevertheless, repression will not solve
the economic problems of Indonesia since repression does not touch
upon the root causes of the crisis, namely international overcapacity
of production. Why are so many companies not enough profitable?
Simply because they have to compete against capital-intensive
multinationals on the one hand and low-wage producers (particularly
in China) on the other hand. Why do so many companies and banks have
bad loans? Simply because there has been too much investment,
overinvestment, in the fight for market share during the Southeast
Asian boom. And there is nothing typical Asian in that, such crises
of overproduction have occurred throughout the history of capitalism
and are actually a key feature of capitalist competition.
Overproduction is the logical consequence of a system that has the
technological capacity to produce affluence but where the means of
production are in the private hands of capitalists. Driven by the
hunger for profit capitalists invest in production capacity to sell
more commodities. In the end such individual decisions have to lead
to overproduction since every capitalist wants to maximise his
profit. If a minority of competing individuals decide over what
society should produce, instead of a majority of co-operating
individuals (i.e. the labouring classes), the result will always be
cyclical recurrent crises. And the anarchy of production spills over
into a social anarchy.

The bourgeoisie will always try to transfer the costs of its own
system onto the backs of the workers and the poor. Capitalists can
give 3 answers to the problem of overproduction. First, they can
declare all the less profitable firms bankrupt, which means
unemployment on such scale that society transforms into pure
dynamite. To be clear, in spite of the unprecedented lay-offs
following the Asian crisis, the Indonesian bourgeoisie has not opted
for the eradication of overcapacity as advocated by the IMF but
instead has chosen to provide partial government support for ailing
companies and banks under the Indonesian Bank Restructuring Agency
(IBRA). To secure its economic interests and avoid complete social
disruption, the bourgeoisie can indeed call in the state to mitigate
the direct effects of the crisis (the second option). But the IMF's
argument is basically right, the root of the crisis, overproduction,
is not removed and thereby society stumbles along a protracted social
crisis. On the other hand, the IMF's prescription of eradicating all
overcapacity would mean a crisis on such a devastating scale that the
current crisis would look like the Garden of Eden before the Fall of
Man. And the third possible solution for the crisis is even worse. A
war would physically eliminate the overcapacity by destroying
factories, buildings and workers. For the moment Asia is already the
scene of dozens of small-scale low-intensity armed conflicts. The
military build-up in the region is huge, a real arms race in which
every country takes part. Inevitably that will lead in the future to
large-scale full-intensity armed conflicts between states.

But let's stay clear, there is nothing inevitable. We were talking
about the answers of the bourgeoisie. On any account, the oppressed
classes don't have to accept the leadership of the bourgeoisie. They
can formulate their own answer to the crisis, an answer that
necessarily has to break away from the bourgeois system, capitalism.
For the working class, the urban poor and the small peasants there is
no solution within the limits of capitalism. Their solution can only
lie in advancing the revolution towards the point that they take over
the rule over society themselves(37). At that point only, the masses
will get rid of the spectre of militarism and exploitation.

"Bourgeois revolutions like those of the eighteenth century
storm swiftly from success to success, their dramatic effects outdo
each other, men and things seem set in sparkling brilliants, ecstasy
is the everyday spirit; but they are short-lived, soon they have
attained their zenith, and a long crapulent depression lays hold of
society before it learns soberly to assimilate the results of its
storm-and-stress period. On the other hand, proletarian revolutions,
like those of the nineteenth century, criticize themselves
constantly, interrupt themselves continually in their own course,
come back to the apparently accomplished, in order to begin it
afresh, deride with unmerciful thoroughness the inadequacies,
weaknesses, and paltriness of their first attempts, seem to throw
down their adversary only in order that he may draw new strength from
the earth and rise before them again even more gigantic, recoil ever
and anon from the indefinite prodigiousness of their own aims
&endash; until a situation has been created which makes all turning
back impossible, and the conditions themselves cry out:
Hic Rhodus, hic salta!
Here is the rose, here dance! (38)"

15 With left populism we mean political movements led
by bourgeois civilian or military personalities, like Chavez in
Venezuela, who combine authoritarian tendencies with social demagogy
and nationalism.

27 The military for instance is very well aware of
the possibilities for and attempts by the Marxists and related
Leftists to get a breakthrough in Indonesia. I have this information
from a family member of high level officers who did not know that he
was talking to a Marxist.

28 Interview in Times of India, December 31,
1997

29 But the CIA could not really prevent the text from
being published because of the Internet. The George Washington
University's National Security Archive put their copy of the book
online as a protest against the undemocratic behaviour of the CIA.
You can find it at
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB52/

36 Economism is the idea that workers must limit
their struggle to economic demands and should not be involved in
politics.

37 For a program of demands read the last chapter of
Jean Duval, Indonesia: the Weakest Link of South East Asian
Capitalism, March 2000,
http://www.marxist.com/Asia/indo_economy400.html This is a general
Marxist program for Indonesia. Of course such program should be
completed by concrete demands starting from the current situation in
Indonesia and every city, region, factory, school,... in which the
program is advanced. The guideline for such demands is advancing the
struggle of those who are oppressed to liberate themselves. Therefor
a demand is never an end in itself but a means to mobilise the masses
who in their movement will develop the structures by which they will
rule society themselves.

38 "Here is the rose, here dance!" From Aesop's fable
'The Swaggerer' referring to one who boasted that he had made a
gigantic leap in Rhodes (which also means 'rose' in Greek) and was
challenged: "Here is Rhodes, here leap!" Marx's paraphrase, "Here is
the rose, here dance!" is from the quotation used by Hegel in the
preface to his book 'Outlines of the Philosophy of Right'
(1821).

39 I want to thank Jean Duval for his helpful and
lengthy remarks, and more in general for being my mentor on Indonesia
and on Marxism.